Spectre of multi-million-dollar counterfeiting hangs over Super Bowl Sunday

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Behind the glitz, gloss and razzmatazz of this year’s record-breaking Super Bowl, worldwide networks of counterfeiters continue to exploit the global sporting showcase.

According to the NFL, this year’s event drew an average record TV audience of 127.7 million viewers – marking a 3% year-on-year increase – peaking at nearly 140 million during the second quarter, as Philadelphia closed in on a 40-22 victory over Kansas City. In fact, the Super Bowl is among the most valuable sporting events in the US, with projections indicating spending for 2025 will top US$18bn. TV revenue is the big earner with 30-second commercials averaging US$8m or more to air. Elsewhere, related consumer spending spikes for sales of event apparel and memorabilia. In 2024, the average per-person expenditure was $86.04 – marking a 2% year-on-year increase.

But it also offers a golden opportunity for counterfeiters with hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of fake and sub-prime look-a-like Super Bowl merchandise put on sale ahead of the big day. The counterfeiters are fast, inventive, adaptable – and the bigger the occasion the bigger the perceived opportunity. Ahead of the 2020 Super Bowl, nearly 180,000 counterfeit sporting goods, worth an estimated US$123m were seized. The following year a similar amount of fake merchandise valued at around US$100m were seized.

Investigators readily admit it’s likely to be the tip of a very significant iceberg, as consumers to unwittingly purchase counterfeit jerseys, t-shirts, hats and more. Typically, more than 5,000 websites are shut down every year amid coordinated operations between US law enforcement officials and the NFL.

Bigger the event, bigger the opportunity

As with all high-profile events, the annual sporting bonanza is used as an opportunity to drive revenue to networks of criminal gangs determined to use the ill-gotten gains for other nefarious purposes. Fraudsters are hiding behind a mass of obscure networks of legal entities and loopholes. Fake goods are often made offshore, before having logos, tags, badges and packaging added and subsequently sold on to unsuspecting consumers.

At the same time, social media platforms are a widespread and readily accessible criminal springboard to selling fakes, and intellectual property-infringing products – not just sporting or high-value luxury goods, but consumer electronics, cosmetics, automotive parts and illegal streaming services. Masterminds behind the counterfeit trade often rely on intermediaries to help ensure the smooth running of their criminal enterprises, while also providing a firewall to obscure upstream sections of fraudulent supply chains.

Counting the cost of counterfeits

The identification of copycat and counterfeit products, infringing websites and fake accounts on many of the world’s largest online marketplaces, social media platforms and search engines, pose a massive headache for global brands.

In fact, counterfeiting is now the second biggest source of criminal income worldwide after drugs and people trafficking, according to the United Nations Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice. Some estimate it could represent up to 25% of high-value goods’ sales, adding a sizeable contribution to the US$2trillion global counterfeit market, which also includes pharmaceuticals and entertainment products.

In Europe alone, more than 86 million fake items valued at US$2.1billion and representing nearly 6% of trade, were seized in 2022. The global picture is far greater. But thanks to AI-enhanced technology and machine learning, it’s now possible to request the filing of takedown notices at the click of a button as soon as breaches are spotted.

Saturn AI is running rings around fraudsters

Gowling WLG has invested significantly in developing tech powered brand protection service Saturn, to help continually safeguard its clients’ products simultaneously across multiple global online sites.

Thanks to a combination of clever tech, brand expertise and amassed regional legal know-how, Saturn delivers fast, smart enforcement underpinned with intelligent software. The result is a holistic service that successfully manages and safeguards client brands online, while helping improve consumer protection.

Saturn’s smart searching and reporting functions drive a fast route to action and resolution, precisely tailored to meet clients’ requirements, Saturn performs global searches, provides reports, real-time gap analysis and issue take downs from a single point, at speed, at scale and at the click of a button – rather than in a piecemeal one-by-one fashion. The service stands apart from other solutions as it is tailored, co-ordinated and managed by a team of qualified IP lawyers who have decades of experience of brand enforcement for household names. As a result, the technology can simply and easily deliver more cost-effective, well-informed and personalised strategies to better suit the nuances of any specific brand.

See Saturn showcased at INTA 2025

We’re going to be at the upcoming INTA 2025 Annual Meeting in San Diego. If you’d like to see our global brand protection service Saturn showcased in person, please get in touch. Alternatively, we look forward to catching-up at the event.